The present disclosure relates to a polymeric actuator, an actuator device, a method of manufacturing the polymeric actuator, and a method of manufacturing the actuator device. More particularly, the present disclosure relates to a polymeric actuator in which a displacement amount is increased after a structure is simplified and in which a pair of facing portions disposed so as to face each other, and a folded portion through which one end portions of the pair of facing portions are coupled to each other are composed of an inner electrode layer, an electrolyte layer, and an outer electrode layer which are laminated in order one upon another, thereby simplifying a structure, an actuator device including the polymeric actuator, a method of manufacturing the polymeric actuator, and a method of manufacturing the actuator device.
A polymeric actuator is used in various kinds of fields of various kinds of electronic apparatuses such as a controller of an electronic device, a robot, medical equipment, a micromachine, and an image pickup apparatus.
Such a polymeric actuator, for example, is used as a driving portion for generating a driving force with which a lens is moved in an optical axis direction or in a direction perpendicular to an optical axis in the various kinds of image pickup apparatuses such as a video camera and a still camera. In this case, lenses (lens group) are moved in the optical axis direction by the polymeric actuator, thereby carrying out the focusing or zooming. Also, an image pickup element such as a lens, a Charge Coupled Device (CCD) or a Complementary Metal-Oxide Semiconductor (CMOS) is moved in a direction perpendicular to the optical axis, thereby carrying out hand movement correction.
The polymeric actuator as described above is an actuator which is displaced by a stimulation applied thereto from the outside, for example, a chemical stimulation, an electrical stimulation, a thermal stimulation, a light stimulation, a magnetic stimulation or the like. In particular, in recent years, a research which is of a type in which a displacement is generated by the electrical stimulation to generate the driving force has been actively carried out.
Such a polymeric actuator has a merit that the polymeric actuator has a high energy efficiency, and can be manufactured at a low cost. In general, however, since an amount of displacement is small, an actuator device in which plural polymeric actuators are coupled to one another in order to increase an amount of displacement is used in many cases.
For the purpose of using the polymeric actuator and actuator device described above in the various kinds of fields, preferably, after the miniaturization has been ensured, the increase in the amount of displacement is realized.
In order to cope with such a situation, as far as the existing polymeric actuator and actuator device concerned, there is known a technique with which the miniaturization and the increase in the amount of displacement are realized. This technique, for example, is disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2007-28749 (hereinafter referred to as Patent Document 1).
The polymeric actuator disclosed in Patent Document 1 is formed in a plate-like shape extending in one direction, and is structured in such a way that electrode layers are provided on sides facing each other through an electrolyte layer, and the electrode layers intersect with each other in an intermediate portion of the electrolyte layer.
Also, the actuator device disclosed in Patent Document 1 is also structured in such a way that in the polymeric actuators, the electrode layers are connected to one another in end portions thereof in a longitudinal direction, and the end portions are coupled to each other in the longitudinal direction of the adjacent polymeric actuators by a fastener, thereby coupling plural polymeric actuators to one another.